Fate's Five
by Blaze Moonlight
Summary: Five times fate went one way for a Harry Potter character and one time it went another.
1. Colin Creevey: Death

Five times Colin Creevey didn't die and one time he did.

1 – When Dennis was three months old their mother had died – Colin had been distraught and slipped away from his father. It had taken them three days to find him in a park seven miles away from where he'd last been seen. When he'd finally recovered from the cold and the damp he'd realised that he had to stay healthy because mummy had liked that.

2 - When he was four years old he had been hiding behind the wheels of his father's milk van. He'd been so small that Mr Creevey had reversed without even seeing him. It had been Dennis' screams that had alerted his father to what had happened and since then Colin had always felt he'd owed his brother something.

3 – In his first year at Hogwarts he'd nearly been petrified by the Basilisk. It had only been his camera that had saved him. He'd always loved photography and being able to capture things as they happened and freeze them forever but it wasn't until it had saved his life the he realised quite how much he loved it.

4 – When he was fourteen he'd done something very stupid. He'd gone swimming in a reservoir. He knew it wasn't very safe but he'd wanted to impress the other boys in his area and show them that he was more than just a runt from a 'posh' boarding school. He hadn't anticipated _quite_ how cold the water would be…

5 – In what ought to have been his sixth year of Hogwarts he'd had to go on the run from Death Eaters with his brother. At around four months in they'd slipped up and been caught. Colin had been terrified that they wouldn't make it but, just as things looked like they were at an end, he'd heard the crack of apparition. The arrival of a stranger had given them both time to escape.

1 – He _needed_ to fight in the final battle. He had to defend himself and his brother and his friends and the world of magic. He _wasn't_ too young – he was _almost_ of age. He had almost survived. He took out three death eaters before being hit with the killing curse. It had been quick and clean and later a lot of people would assume he had been an easy kill. In fact he had kept the death eater duelling for more then five minutes before the man had found a weakness in his guard big enough to attack through. The last thing Colin ever felt was pride.


	2. Justin Finch Fletchley: Survival

Five times Justin Finch-Fletchley survived and one time he didn't.

1 - He'd nearly died when he was born. He had been dangerously premature and had spent the first few weeks of his life in intensive care. Both of his parents had been terrified that they were going to lose him and they nearly did. Even as an adult he thinks that Muggle medicine beats healing any day due to the sheer determination of the doctors to save lives even when all they had was ambulance equipment.

2 – His premature birth had left him suffering asthma and, when he was six he'd suffered a fatally bad attack. His tutor had found him in his room unconscious and wheezing. His parents had called it a miracle he'd lasted long enough to be found – when he was older and had mastered the charms to prevent him ever having a serious attack again he wonders if that was his first ever bit of accidental magic.

3 – In his entire time at Hogwarts Justin never suffered anything worse than a slight cold. His friends think it's a miracle but he suspects he simply got all of his illness out of the way prior to that. When he was nine he'd suffered influenza and pneumonia simultaneously. He had nearly died several times over the two months of sickness and relapses it took him to recover. He always prayed he would never be ill again- he didn't think he could stand it.

4 – He had thought his mother was being over protective when she worried about the dangers of magic until his second year. Up until then for him magic had been a good thing but after the basilisk had almost killed him he was always a little wary of how dangerous magic could be when not used for good. It is the fact that looking through a magical ghost was what saved him that kept him from swearing off spells forever.

5 – He hadn't made it to the final battle. His galleon had alerted him of when it started and he'd apparated directly out of the restaurant he'd been in despite the number of Muggles watching. He'd arrived at Hogsmeade and immediately raced towards Hogwarts but, before he reached the battle, a falling bit of wall had hit him over the head and knocked him unconscious. Had he made it through he would have arrived just in time to walk straight into You-Know-Who himself.

1 – He'd lasted to twenty-seven years of age. A surprisingly long time when he considered the perils he'd faced. Nobody ever really knew the details. Only that he'd been found in his study next to a broken window with his wand drawn and a bullet through his skull. No culprit was ever found but several people had been horrified to find that he'd left everything he owned, not to them, but to charities working for the development of Muggle medicine.


	3. Michael Corner: Relationships

**_A.N - I'm open to any suggestions on characters and/or 'things'. Also this one contains mild SLASH._**

Five times Michael Corner's relationships didn't work and one time one did.

1 – His first _ever _date had been in his third year when he'd been asked to Hogsmeade by a blushing Morag McDougal. The date had been a disaster and they'd both spend the whole time talking awkwardly about the weather. Before they returned to the castle they made a pact never to speak of 'the incident' again.

2 – He'd gone to the Yule Ball with Lisa Turpin. They had argued the whole time and he'd eventually called her a stupid banshee. She'd thrown her drink over him but he'd banished it with a flick of his wand and left her to go and flirt with one of the Durmstrang students.

3 – It was at the Yule he'd met Ginny Weasley. He'd taken an instant liking to her. They'd spent the entire evening talking about school, Quidditch, and the tournament and it had been one of the best nights of his teenage years. They'd stayed together well into fifth year and it had been her that told him about the DA. He'd never been in a relationship that serious before and had begun to let his world revolve around her. They had broken up, however, shortly after the Quidditch final when he'd made several jibes about the validity of Gryffindor's victory the humour in which had gone completely over her head and caused her to break up with him, mistaking his wit for bad sportsmanship. They had eventually returned to talking amicably but he always resented her a little for not getting his joke.

4 – Dating Cho Chang had been both his the biggest mistake of his life and one of his smartest decisions. After getting together at the end of his fifth year they stayed together throughout his sixth and seventh years even when they were reduced to communicating through the rare notes that they could slip past the Carrow's security. It was through him that she properly got over Cedric Diggory and it was through her and her collection of 'posters' that he had accidentally discovered his bisexuality. When they eventually split up it was because they had both realised that their relationship had fizzled out and that they had out-grown each other romantically. The remained friends however and Cho became Michael's leading authority of the way women's minds worked.

5 – After discovering his interest in men he'd dated several different girls and guys, most notably Zacharias Smith. The relationship had proved that he was still capable of disastrous dates and involvement with people he was completely incompatible with. He and Smith had argued at every turn and he found himself disapproving of everything the blond did. The relationship had been a disaster waiting to happen and it finally died in an epic shouting match, which had caused not only Michael's neighbours, but also his neighbours' neighbours, to complain about the noise. He and Zacharias had embodied the concept of utterly incompatible.

1 – The idea of a 'proper' relationship with anybody in his immediate circle of friends had never appealed to Michael who believed _friends_ should stay that way. However when, six months and 5 not-the-right-ones after Zacharias, his long time best friend, Terry Boot, had grabbed him by the jaw and kissed him like the world was ending he realised that maybe the problem with his ex's had always been that they _weren't_ his friend.


	4. Oliver Wood: Hating

Five times Oliver Wood hated Marcus Flint and one time he didn't 

1 – For all of his abilities and all of his later confidence he'd been incredibly awkward as a first year. Although he'd been raised in a magical family he was still one of the poorest students in the year and utterly failed to grasp most of concepts he was taught. He also struggled greatly to make friends – everybody liked Quidditch but no other student was interested in it so completely. In his first year, before his glory, he had been an easy target and Marcus Flint had made every use of that he could find.

2 – When he'd joined the Quidditch team for the first time it had been Marcus Flint that had made a point of telling him at every opportunity that he would _never_ be good enough. His teammates also weren't so sure about having a player so young and therefore didn't intervene. Marcus Flint had been to blame for that _tiny_ streak of insecurity that had haunted him his entire life, causing him to miss himself out of motivational speeches and blame himself for losses. Some people seemed to like that fact that those moments of self doubt gave him a slight inclination towards modesty but Oliver Wood longed to return to the days when he had _known_ he was the best.

3 – Every time he'd lost the Quidditch cup at Hogwarts. Never mind that all of the other teams shared the blame out – or occasionally lumped it on the seeker. If Oliver Wood lost at anything it was because of Marcus Flint and his dirty tactics. Nobody played fair against Oliver Wood and won.

4 – The one time he won the Quidditch cup. Because he should have held it more than once and he would have, could have, if it hadn't been for Marcus Flint leading the Slytherin team to repeated victory. The one chaser (and captain) who knew how to win against him.

5 – When he joined Puddlemere United. He'd been so please because getting onto a professional Quidditch team was such an achievement. The he'd found out Flint had gotten onto the Magpies squad and the glory had just faded out. He wasn't _that_ special.

1 – Five years into their career, Oliver still saw Marcus Flint as the ultimate rival. But now he didn't have him – he needed him. Because if there was one person who could make Oliver want to be faster, smarter, stronger and better, it was Marcus Flint. When he wasn't playing the ex-Slytherin he missed both the familiarity of Flint's face and tactics but also spark and the intensity that they had between them. Only when he was playing Marcus Flint could Oliver really get his _soul_ into the game.

**(A/N - as suggested by Kauri-Blume. Next please!)**


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